The MUOS-3 payload, encapsulated within its bulbous payload fairing, is readied for installation atop the Atlas V 551. This will be the first of 13 missions planned by United Launch Alliance (ULA) in 2015. Photo Credit: ULA

As it enters its ninth year of operations since its formation as a merger between Boeing and […]

Artist’s impression of MESSENGER in orbit around Mercury. Following a highly successful decade-long mission, the spacecraft will eventually face its demise while crashing on Mercury’s surface, sometime next spring. Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

The coming of the New Year is a time for celebration and reflection on […]

Scheduled for launch in early 2015, NASA’s Soil Moisture Active Passive, or SMAP mission, will track Earth’s water into one of its last hiding places: the soil. SMAP soil moisture data will, among other things, aid in predictions of agricultural productivity, weather and climate. Image Credit: NASA

With the glow of its RS-27A first-stage engine and trio of Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) piercing the gloom and murk, the first Delta II in almost three years takes flight from a foggy Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. Photo Credit: Robert C. Fisher/AmericaSpace

Since August 2011, NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity has been exploring the rim of a 14-mile-wide crater called Endeavour that is geologically very distinct from anything the robot craft had previously encountered. Ancient rocks and clay […]